THE BEAT e141 Journey with Jesus Toward a Transformed Heart (how we live on the narrow road)

This is Faith to Witness 99, motivating us to hear God and share the Shepherd.

Season 2 Episode 141 

THE BEAT | Journey with Jesus Toward a Transformed Heart (how we live on the narrow road) 

Quick Take 

Hey human, let’s consider what the narrow gate and the wide gate mean through the eyes of our Shepherd. And how this comes to us in the context of the authority of Jesus… in our lives. Can we recommit to the journey? E141 Thanks for listening.

Can you describe your narrow road with Jesus?

I’m Kathryn Bise, your host.

Jesus answered to everyone’s question about his authority. With his life. By changing the lives of others through his authority to forgive sin. Redemption was finally “near.” So close you could touch his robe.

Divine authority that is sovereign. One Teacher, one Father, one Messiah.

Last week I asked this question:

If I have declared, if you have declared that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of the living God, like Peter, how does his authority show up in my life? Your life, human?

To go there, I want to remember, clarify what Jesus was really doing to establish his authority in that context. He was setting the foundation for each of us to live by it. To live by his authority. That his message from his Heavenly Father would bring to our lives a completely different way to live. Not different from God’s message from Genesis through Malachi, but a message fulfilled through the proximity of a Savior who had come to walk alongside us, and ultimately to go before us, in living a righteous life as no one before him had done.

The Savior Amongst Us

The Savior amongst us. When I landed on Matthew 7:13, I read the passage about entering the narrow gate.

Matthew 7:13

 

The Narrow and Wide Gates

 

13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

 

This passage has been characterized by how Jesus ends it, “and only a few find it.” And for some it resonates as the difference of the way of righteous compared to the way of unrighteousness.  

But I stopped to think about what Jesus had said, before this passage. How he lead up to this in the previous chapters.

That he would fulfill the law, and we were to remain faithful to it. He addresses common behaviors and familiar commandments:

• Murder, but he moves past it, to anger, any malicious intent born out of not loving someone.

• Adultery, but he moves past it, to not the physical act, but the mental act of intent.

• Divorce, but he moves past it, to understand the consequences.

• Oaths, but he moves past it, to no oaths at all. Just obedience, with a “yes” or “no.” That we do not swear by anything because it is all his. The Heavens. Earth. Jerusalem. Your head. It is all within God’s sovereign authority. We own nothing.

• Retaliation, but he moves past it, to no retaliation at all. Give to others who take it, give in abundance, two miles, not one. Return persecution with humility.

• Love for enemies, but he moves past it, to love as your Heavenly Father does, with an equally weighted hand. Blessings for the unrighteous.

• Giving, but he moves past it, to no expectation of acknowledgement from others.

• Praying, but he moves past it, to doing so in private with your Heavenly Father. He will reward you.

• Fasting, but he moves past it, to doing so in private, and your Heavenly Father will reward you.

• Treasures, but he moves past it, to only those treasures that will be bound in Heaven. Treasures that represent your heart.

• Worry, but he moves past it, to do not worry ever, about anything. Like pagans. Seek your God who provides what you need.

• Judging others, but he moves past it, to understanding that God will judge you by the measure of how you judge others.

• Ask, seek, knock, he moves past earning anything, to a new spiritual level, to pursue God’s love. And in doing this, do so to act toward others how you would want them to act toward you.

Outward Religious Observance or Internal Heart Transformation

What Jesus has outlined is to find our narrow way through life. It requires a life with one God as master. And it takes very little in any area of our earthly terrain to take a side path that leads to a very wide, crowded road. So many do it.

It is a way that is so narrow that much of it has only width for two: God and you. God, you and helping someone else. Actually, I would argue that there are many places along the narrow way that there is only room for one: Jesus, carrying us. Because his burden is light.

It is a way that is so narrow it feels lonely and isolated by the measure of the crowd dweller.

It is a way that focuses solely on doing everything for God, through Jesus, by the power of the Holy Spirit. The path is possible because Jesus comes before.

Hey human, it is a way, the only way to a transformed heart that lives fully under the authority of Jesus.

How Does Jesus Define Narrow?

So, when we consider transformation of the heart, whatever deters from a spiritual walk with Jesus, what Jesus goes on to say later in Chapter 7, has a new meaning for me.

Matthew 7:23

 

True and False Disciples

 

21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ 23 Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’

 

“I never knew you.”  When we publicly demonstrate spiritual practices with the wrong spiritual motive, out of self promotion, self interest, self indulgence, self obligation, we do not represent Jesus, nor do we get to know him more deeply. Or at all. It makes sense that Jesus will not recognize us. We haven’t really spent time with him, for him.

We aren’t living in his name because we aren’t living by his nature.

How far are we to take this? Later in the gospel of Matthew I think Jesus defines narrow.

Matthew 18:8-10

 

8 If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. 9 And if your eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.

 

Here’s how far. That anything keeping us from staying on the narrow path with Jesus has got to go. Whatever earthly sacrifice, do it.

So, the Clearest Picture of Jesus as Lord of My Life

So let’s look at Matthew 7:13-14 again.

Matthew 7:13

 

The Narrow and Wide Gates

 

13 “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. 14 But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

 

What is the clearest picture of Jesus as Lord of my life?

What do we know about the narrow way?

It gives you a choice.

The broad choice is easy to find, swings open easily for many at a time, with a view that invites an easy way with crowds of people.

The small choice requires looking, a firm hand to open and enter single file, with only a few visible steps ahead of you, and few travelers.

What do we know about the narrow way?

It is a road.

Our earthly life is not a destination. It is a road toward or away from eternal life. Not this life, but the next.

What do we know about the narrow way?

It is a road one must find.

Our redemption road requires the process of finding. We must seek it and leave behind anything that keeps us from being on it.

What do we know about the narrow way?

It is a road.

Check out this song, by Chris Renzema, called Narrow Road. Link in show notes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rlp8PsdsVJ0

I leave us with these lyrics.

You said it’d be a narrow road

You said it’d be a narrow road

So why am I surprised when it seems I’m on my own?

You said it’d be a narrow road

This world would never be my home

The journey might be lonely, but I’d never be alone

Oh, oh, oh

I’d never be alone

Beautiful, thanks Chris. How we live on the narrow road is how we bear testimony to the authority of Jesus in our lives.